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If 15 to 20 per cent of Toronto residents comprise the diehard Rob Ford supporters dubbed Ford Nation, a slightly higher percentage — maybe 25 to 30 per cent — see red at the sight or mention of anything Ford.

So, it’s not uncommon this week to hear cries of “I told you so” at the water cooler.

They warned you that there was no gravy train at city hall to halt, only a Rob Ford train wreck to witness.

They predicted the volatile, unstable, mendacious mayor with a pot-smoking past and a penchant for unruly behaviour, who suffers from lone-wolf syndrome, would be incapable of leading 44 independent councillors.

They fretted about putting such a combustible character in the mayor’s office, modern media from Alaska to Zimbabwe only a click away.

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They screamed, “Don’t believe the lies” when Ford stormed across the campaign trail promising to cut $2 billion from the city budget without cutting a single service — “guaranteed.”

They laughed when Ford promised “subways, subways, subways” for free, free, free. All we got was one short subway — and it’s not free. Property taxes are going up 1.6 per cent for the subway alone. Plus $2 billion in tax money from the governments of Ontario and Canada.

They have every right to say, “I told you so.” But they should resist. A little bit of humility from this huge voting block is in order if they are to deliver their naturally aligned mayoral candidate, Olivia Chow, to the mayor’s office.

Chow leads most opinion polls testing voter preference a year away from the Oct. 27 vote. But we are getting ahead of ourselves. And nothing threatens this group’s electoral success as the cockiness borne out of a sense of righteous entitlement.

Ford Nation is apoplectic at this smugness, the down-the-nose glance that says, “What? Are you stupid? Don’t you know . . .?”

These polar opposites will never attract each other. But if they remain stubbornly rooted in their rhetoric, unmindful of the grievances of the other, another group will determine the city’s future.

It’s not for lack of trying that extreme and dogmatic politicians like Rob Ford rarely rise to power in moderate Toronto. It’s not in our DNA. We like a maverick, but not a madman, as mayor. Rob Ford was an accident of time and circumstance. But to dismiss his stunning election as a non-recurring aberration is to tempt fate. Better to learn from it.

Several times over the past three years, a Ford Nation member has emailed to sneer something like: If the downtown elites and media mavens are so wise and powerful, how did they allow such a dolt to become mayor?

Or, as Ian put it, reflecting Don Cherry at Ford’s inauguration: “Isn’t it wonderful that Rob Ford can tell all the left-wing idiots to go fly a kite?”

What’s there to learn?

Toronto has changed quite a bit. The gap between the elite, the high wage earners and the dispossessed in the suburbs is growing. Resentment rankles. Meanwhile, the middle class feels squeezed and grows frustrated when their taxes are wasted, and envious when it is used to provide social services they can scarcely afford.

They are susceptible to campaigns built on stopping the gravy train. But they’re not just gullible, brain-dead morons. Something lit the fuse that led to Rob Ford — something we will examine tomorrow.

From the day David Miller entered the mayor’s office, he looked for ways to spend money to build a great city. You can’t build a great city for free, he said. From the day Rob Ford entered city hall, he looked for ways to chop spending. They were on a collision course.

Miller’s administration spent money at an unprecedented pace. In the first six years of amalgamation under Mayor Mel Lastman, the city’s budget jumped 14 per cent, to $6.4 billion. During Miller’s two terms, the budget increased 44 per cent, three times as fast.

Backed by the core army of Ford Haters Inc., defined by union membership, the cognoscenti, city builders and guardians of the urban region, centered downtown, the Miller regime might have survived.

But arrogance set in. Councillors started spending on themselves and on causes that would grease their re-election. And Rob Ford made sure everyone noticed.

That’s how we got here. The return to moderate Toronto won’t be forged by either of the polar opposites. It will be up to the majority.

If the Ford Haters link up with the moderates, at least their treasured principles of a civil and caring society will triumph. If not, it is Ford Nation that will hold the balance of power.

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